Draft with Oliver Schneider

Owen Pauling

Oliver thought that his draft went terribly. One of his main reasons for this was that there were a lot of similar commons runs, resulting in many cards such as Timberwatch Elf being picked up in multiples by various drafters. His initial plan was to draft BW clerics, a powerful deck favoured by many of the top English players in the Ons/Ons/Leg draft format. Due to the runs seen in the draft and the way the picks ended up, Oliver was stuck in the position of not being able to get deep enough into his clerics. With no breaks to jump into an under-drafted colour or bully his way into somebody else’s colour, Oliver sat back and stuck to his original draft plan. He is also concerned about his lack of answers to flyers and the abundance of removal that showed up in the draft. Mike Major, for example, picked up two Lavamancer’s Skill and two Shocks during the Onslaught boosters.

Did you face any tough decisions during the draft?

In Oliver’s words the draft was “very uninspiring” as he felt there were little options for changing his archetype and therefore carried on drafting the best cards available for his deck. His one mistake may have been taking a Deftblade Elite over a White Knight, but he is still unsure whether this was correct or indeed a mistake. Oliver really wanted a Deftblade for its useful abilities, and this was the only booster in the draft where he had the opportunity to take one. In later boosters Oliver was able to get two White Knights and so he was happy about the decision at the deckbuilding stage. Oliver did also decide to start picking up zombies while looking for a chance to change his strategy, but like the clerics there was a lack of this tribe too.

What are your predictions for the draft, and who do you think will 3-0 the pod?

In Oliver’s opinion he has the second worst deck in the pod. He says the worst deck is Jason’s as he was making some bad picks and rare grabbing. This was because Jason was sat with team mates on either side of him, and once he realised the draft wasn’t going his way he took a hit for the team and passed them cards to improve their decks, and thus boost the team’s overall performance. The better decks in the pod were drafted by Mike Major, Artturi Bjork, Steve Barltrop and Chris Clapton. Oliver’s favourite to win the draft is Mike, with his UR deck. Oliver’s outlook is that anything better than a 1-2 finish for him in this draft is very good considering his card pool. He considers it possible he will lose all three matches should he not get paired against Jason.